Authors: Highland Fling
“Your reasoning is faulty,” James said flatly. “Anything can happen to a woman and child alone at the head of the glen.”
“I will do as I please, James Carsley. Rory and Dugald can take up residence nearby if it becomes necessary.”
“Rory and Dugald,” James said, “take their orders from Ned.”
Kate stayed, but her temper did not improve.
They saw nothing of the new bailie for several days, but Rothwell made it plain that, bailie or no bailie, he intended to see changes made at Glen Drumin before long.
“Manufacturing whisky illicitly is too dangerous,” he told MacDrumin one morning over a late breakfast, “and since you flatly refuse to pay the duties—”
“I have told you, lad,” MacDrumin said, “’tis no more right and proper that we should pay duty on a product we produce in the Highlands than that a man who grows corn in Gloucestershire or one who mines tin in Cornwall should have to do the same.”
“He is right, Ned,” James said, nodding.
“Nonetheless, that is the law,” Rothwell said, and Maggie heard the note of finality in his voice. “The men must be encouraged to seek other sorts of work.”
Maggie said indignantly. “You are very highhanded today, sir. The men of this clan will not change their ways merely to suit their English overlord, but just what sorts of work have you decided it will be proper for them to seek?”
Looking from one person to another, Rothwell said quietly, “I don’t know yet, but people here in Glen Drumin simply cannot continue to exist as they did before the uprisings. That much is obvious to the meanest intelligence.”
“Thanks to the English,” Maggie said bitterly.
He gave her a rueful smile but shook his head and said, “We will all do better to learn to live with the changes they have wrought here, and to profit from them.”
“‘Lord Zeus, listen to the little bird’s voice,’” Mac-Drumin said with a snort. “Just how would you advise us to do that, lad? We’ve no money, and the land will support sheep on the high slopes or barley down below but little else.”
Maggie could see that Rothwell did have a plan and was uncertain of how it would be received. He said, “Even in the past your people remained poor, Mac-Drumin, with little to call their own. I believe I know how they all might prosper in time.”
“If you do, lad, let’s hear it. I confess, I’ve thought and thought over the years without coming up with a thing that would work—other than selling the whisky.”
“You do not have the resources for this plan, but I do, and I am willing to do what I can to help.” He glanced at Maggie, and she saw warmth in his eyes even before he smiled at her.
“What is your plan, sir?” she asked more gently.
Taking a deep breath, he said, “I propose to frank the men while they seek work, until they are well enough established in new homes to look after their wives and children. The details remain to be worked out, of course, but it seems to me, the only thing preventing any man of the glen from going to a seaside town where work is plentiful, or setting himself up as a farmer in the lowlands, where the earth is much more fertile, is mere money.”
“Mere money,” MacDrumin said thoughtfully. “Aye, lad, mere money could do a lot to help my men and their families. Have you really got enough for all of them?”
“I don’t propose to support them all in grand style,” Rothwell said, responding sharply to the note of sarcasm in MacDrumin’s voice. “I suppose I must sound like a popinjay, offering to throw money about to solve your problems. I am not doing that, I promise you, but any man who agrees to go elsewhere can depend on me to frank his move and to transport his family to him when he is ready for them. I’ll look after the families, too, until they can be moved. No man can say fairer than that.”
“’Tis fair,” MacDrumin agreed, “and most generous.”
Maggie had heard enough. “It is nothing of the kind,” she said. “I never heard of anything so barbarous in all my life. How can you be so arrogant, Rothwell? Have you no heart at all, or just an English one?”
“I thought you would be pleased,” he said. “The offer is a generous one.”
“You offer to uproot every man of our clan, ship him off to the coast to fish, or down to the lowlands to grow crops like a border ruffian, and you call that generous! Think of what you are saying! You cannot simply move people about like pawns on a chessboard, as if they had no other ties.”
“I have said I will move their entire families,” he replied. “What other ties could there be?”
“Our people are as attached to their land as they are to their families,” she informed him. “You see only the land, not the people! What can it matter to men if you move them, you ask? Would you leave Rothwell Park and move everything you own to Scarborough or Newcastle because someone told you to do so?”
“It is not the same thing!”
“Is it not? Well, I’m glad to find out what sort of man you are. I just wish I had done so a week before now!”
“And just what do you mean by that?”
She heard the warning note in his voice but ignored it. “I mean, my lord, that now that I know you for what you are, I’ll have nothing more to do with you, and if the good Lord is half as intelligent as He is supposed to be, I shall very soon discover that you have not succeeded in impregnating me with your English seed. As soon as I know that for a fact, you can get on with your annulment or your divorce, for I will have none of you!”
He was on his feet now and so was she. He said grimly, “Leave the room, Maggie. We’ll not discuss such matters at the tops of our voices in your father’s hall.”
“I’ve said all I want to say, but I’ll say
what
I want,
where
I want,” she retorted, “and you’ll not stop me, Rothwell. Women of the Highlands do not leap to obey masculine commands like the women of London do.”
“Then, by God, one of them will very soon learn to do so,” he growled, reaching for her.
“Don’t you dare touch me,” she said, stepping back and watching him warily. “You’ve no right!”
He glanced at MacDrumin, who was watching the scene with avid interest, and said grimly, “Do I not have every right to teach my wife a lesson in conjugal obedience, MacDrumin?”
“Aye, lad, you’ve every right to take a stout switch to the saucy lassie’s backside. However,” he added with a thoughtful air when Rothwell took another step toward Maggie, “the lass having never learned what you English call proper submission to a man’s will, has a will of her own when all’s said and done, so if you do beat her, I’d warn you not to sleep too deep any night soon, lest you waken on a cloud in God’s own heaven—assuming, of course, that you’ve earned the right to go to heaven and won’t be sent the other way when you seek entrance at the pearly gates.”
Rothwell grimaced but made no further move toward Maggie.
James hid a smile, looked down at his empty plate, then suddenly scraped his chair back and got to his feet, saying with an air of false alacrity, “By heaven, I nearly forgot Dugald promised to take me with him today to see the new bothy. I’ve a mind to paint a still life,” he added with a twinkle, “when I finish the picture I’ve been working on.”
MacDrumin chuckled, and when Rothwell relaxed, Maggie smiled at James. “Beware the new bailie, sir,” she said.
“Aye, we will.”
When James had gone, Rothwell looked at MacDrumin and said, “Is this new fellow really likely to cause trouble?”
“He might. They say he’s an inquisitive sort, putting his long nose into places where he’s like to get it snapped off.”
“Then whilst he’s about, tell your people to stay clear of him and the bothies as well. I don’t want more trouble here.”
“Faith, lad, we’ve orders to fill and a shipment to get on its way to Edinburgh. We dealt easily with Fergus Campbell for five years, and this new chappie will be less experienced and more easily led by the nose.”
Maggie left them to their argument, glad to slip away and certain that in this instance, whatever Rothwell might say, her father would prevail, for the men of the clan were accustomed to following his commands and, where the whisky was concerned, would not be quick to take the earl’s side against him. She went about her usual duties but took time to move her things from Rothwell’s bedchamber back to her own, keeping an ear cocked for his voice or his step so that he would not come upon her unawares. When Kate, looking glum, told her sometime later that he had gone out with MacDrumin, she was oddly disappointed.
“You’re a bit gloomy,” Maggie said, “Is Ian sick again?”
“No, only chafing at being kept in, but James said he must rest a day longer, so he will. What the devil am I to do, Mag?” She looked away, biting her lower lip, then looked back and blurted, “I want to turn my hand to the whisky with the others, but Dugald and them won’t agree, and I don’t know how to make them change their minds. But what else is there if I give up going for coaches as, I see now, I must? I won’t bake bread!”
“Rothwell will say that you ought to move to the seaside, to take up mending nets for fishermen, or some such thing.”
“Aye, well, he’s daft is all,” Kate said flatly. “I’ll not move to the sea, but if he wants to take me to London and set me up in grand style, I’ll go right gladly, and take Ian with me.”
“I doubt it’s Rothwell you want to set you up, but you don’t want Ian loose in London,” Maggie said with a weary smile.
Kate bristled at her first words but forgot her posturing when Maggie described what she had seen in the city’s streets, and how she had been tricked. “It sounds a fearsome place,” Kate agreed with a sigh, “but what is to become of us then, Mag?”
Maggie could not give her an answer. She thought James might have a suggestion, and was certain he was responsible for Kate’s decision to give up robbing English coaches, but she was just as certain that a man in James’s position would no more think of taking a wife from the Highlands than Rothwell would of walking naked through the streets of London. And even if James might think of marrying her, Rothwell had it in his power to stop him. Kate would not consider another relationship, but even she would agree she was not suited to be the wife of an English gentleman, even if she was falling in love with him.
Kate left, murmuring that she ought to go to Ian, and Maggie, noting that it was nearly four, went to her bedchamber to change her gown for dinner. Maria was waiting. Seeing a fresh bruise on her cheek and feeling no charity toward men just then, Maggie said sympathetically, “What happened this time, Maria?”
“Nothing, your ladyship.” Maria turned to pour fresh water from a ewer into Maggie’s basin so she could wash her face.
“Perhaps a cold cloth would help.”
“I’ve put some of my lady’s distillation on it, ma’am. She gave me some of what Master James made up for her.” When Maggie looked surprised, Maria added hastily, “My lady thought the Highland air would roughen my skin, ma’am.”
“H-how kind,” Maggie said. Conversation languished after that, but she was soon ready to go downstairs. When she did, she found Rothwell waiting for her, alone.
“Where are the others?” she asked, eyeing him warily.
He smiled, giving rise to a hope that he had forgotten their earlier debate, and said, “Your father has not returned. James has, but he rather foolishly began to put some sort of last coating on his picture and doesn’t want to stop now till he’s done, and Kate ordered her dinner served in Ian’s bedchamber. She said the boy was too tired to come down. I think she is overcautious, fearing James will be displeased if Ian becomes ill again.” He paused, then added evenly, “I have told the servants to let us serve ourselves. Will you sit down?”
“Aye,” she said, suiting action to word, but her wariness returned. “How did you spend your day, sir?”
Taking a seat on the bench opposite her, he said, “I walked with your father for a time, and then roamed about on my own, thinking about a number of things.”
“Did you?” She watched him closely.
“I did, and when I returned, I discovered that my wife had removed all sign of her presence from my room.”
“I meant what I said earlier,” she said quickly. “I mean to sleep alone from now until you depart, for I want to help you end this ridiculous union of ours. We are not suited.”
“Whether we are or not,” he said calmly, “you are still my wife and must obey me until the situation is altered. I have thought about what your father said when I warned you earlier to have a care for how you spoke to me, and lest you begin to think I fear your temper, let me tell you now, for your own sake, that I do not fear you, nor ever shall. I am accustomed to having my orders obeyed, sweetheart, and that will not change. You will sleep with me, in my bed, and that is that.”
She tossed her head. “I remind you, sir, that there was not one word in that peculiar marriage ceremony of ours about wifely obedience. I will spend this night and all that follow it in my own bedchamber, and you will not step a foot inside it.”
“By God, Maggie—”
“Look who I found wandering about the glen,” MacDrumin said cheerfully from the doorway, startling them both. His companion was a rather stout little man, amazingly red of face, and seeing their startled looks, MacDrumin added smoothly, “This fellow here is our new bailie, and I’ve promised him a chopin of the finest whisky in Scotland to drink with his dinner.”
Maggie got up quickly, saying, “Come in at once, the pair of you. James has not had his dinner yet either, Papa. I’ll send for him to join us and order more food for you all.” She avoided meeting Rothwell’s eyes.
“Do that, my dear,” MacDrumin said, “and order plenty of whisky as well, for poor Goodall here means to search the rest of Glen Drumin after he dines. Some lying mischief-maker has told him we’ve a host of illegal stills hereabouts, and though I’ve explained that we’ve only the one for our own use, as allowed by law, he insists he must do his duty and search the whole glen.”
R
OTHWELL WATCHED WITH AMUSEMENT
while Maggie scurried about, calling orders to the servants and making a great thing of extending MacDrumin hospitality to the new bailie. The earl knew she was grateful for the interruption and believed, erroneously, that it had saved her from having to submit to his commands. He could be patient, however, for no matter how long she lingered she would have to go upstairs before the night was done, and when she did, they would have it out, and she would lose the battle.